Analogue undoubtedly deserved the praise and award they received at the Edinburgh Fringe for Mile End, as this piece of devised, multi-media theatre was an enthralling and spectacular experience.

The haunting tale is based on a shocking event at Mile End tube station in 2002 where security guard, Christophe Duclos, was murdered by mentally unstable Stephen Soans-Wade who randomly pushed him in front of an underground train. Soans-Wade had previously attempted to get himself sectioned under the Mental Health Act, but was refused. The piece puts forward the inevitability of this tragedy, the idea that there is no way to escape fate. Mile End shows the lives of characters whose paths are destined to cross, unable to escape the looming tragedy despite their best attempts.

Analogue pulled off a most stunning aesthetic style. Besides the masked performers who introduced an element of Kuroko to the piece, there were some fantastic multi-media features. A moving projection on a gauze screen allowed characters to travel in a way that I had never before encountered in the theatre. The fact that the entire set was on wheels allowed a constantly shifting point of view.

Mile End was wonderfully disorientating, tragic and frightening. Besides the dark themes being dealt with, the nightmare sequences perfectly depicted the weird and disturbing events born of our sub-conscious. Analogue has successfully created a piece that not only questions our understanding of freedom of choice, but was also perfect and fitting foray for the night before Halloween!

Photo: Courtesy of Mikey Delamonde & The Wickham Theatre.